Lindsey Vonn will not race at the season-opening World Cup stop in Soelden, Austria, on Saturday.

“While I physically feel great, I have decided to not race this weekend and instead will focus on returning in Beaver Creek,” she said Wednesday, according to the U.S. Ski Team. “I am confident the extra month of training will ultimately put me in the best position to have a successful season.”

She had been training in Austria for the last week.

Vonn, 29, will now seek to return for the first speed races of the season in Beaver Creek, Colo., beginning Nov. 29. She blew out her right knee in a crash at the World Championships in Schladming, Austria, in February.

Beaver Creek was the original planned return date until her rehab went so well that, after returning to skiing on snow in September, she considered moving her comeback up a month for Saturday’s giant slalom.

The Soelden favorite should be reigning overall World Cup champion Tina Maze of Slovenia, who took the crown of world’s greatest all-around skier with a record-breaking campaign last year.

The U.S. starters for Soelden are scheduled to be Julia Mancuso, Mikaela Shiffrin and Megan McJames on Saturday and Ted Ligety, Bode Miller, Tim Jitloff, Tommy Biesemeyer, Robby Kelley and Kieffer Christianson on Sunday.

Ligety is the reigning World Cup giant slalom champion and World Champion in the event. Miller missed all of last season, recovering from left knee surgery.

“My physical preparation is probably the best it’s been in a long time,” Miller said. “In taking a year away from the World Cup, I’ve been able to let my knee heal completely. I’m ready to return to the World Cup on a hill where I had one of the first wins of my career.”

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Russian Yevgenia Medvedeva broke the record for highest women’s short program score at the Grand Prix Final on Friday.

Medvedeva, who hasn’t lost in more than one year, totaled 79.21 points in Marseille, France. That beat Mao Asada‘s 78.66 from the 2014 World Championships, the previous record under a decade-old judging system.

“I knew approximately about the record,” Medvedeva said through a translator. “For me, it’s one step further.”

Medvedeva leads Canadian Kaetlyn Osmond by 3.67 points going into Saturday’s free skate. No U.S. woman qualified for the six-skater Grand Prix Final for the first time since 2008.

She already holds the free skate world record and can break Yuna Kim‘s record for total score with a solid effort Saturday in Marseille. Medvedeva said she can perform better than she did Friday, specifically with her program interpretation and spins.

“I always strive for perfection,” she said through a translator. “When you stop doing that, you will stop progress.”

The Grand Prix Final concludes with the women’s and men’s free skates and free dance Saturday (schedule here). NBCSN will air coverage Sunday from 8:30-11 p.m. ET.

Earlier Friday, Russians Yevgenia Tarasova and Vladimir Morozov held onto their short-program lead to win the pairs event by 7.14 points over China’s Yu Xiaoyu and Zhang Hao.

Canadians Meagan Duhamel and Eric Radford, the two-time world champions and pre-event favorites, struggled in the short program and free skate and lost for just the second time in the last three seasons.

In the short dance, Canadians Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir recorded the highest score of all time, an 80.50, to take a 2.53-point lead into Saturday’s free dance.

That Virtue and Moir lead is no surprise — they were the top couple in the fall Grand Prix season — but their closest challenger is a surprise.

It is not two-time world champions Gabriella Papadakis and Guillaume Cizeron of France, but instead Americans Maia and Alex Shibutani, who totaled a personal-best short dance.

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Gracie Gold struggled in all four of her competitions this fall, capped by her lowest total score in four years at a Croatian event this week, putting her under scrutiny for the U.S. Championships in six weeks.

She singled three jumps and fell twice across two programs at Golden Spin in Zagreb, Croatia, on Thursday and Friday.

Gold totaled 159.02 points for sixth place, her first time below 160 points since 2012 Skate Canada in her first season as a senior skater.

Italian Carolina Kostner, the 2014 Olympic bronze medalist, won with 196.23 points in her first full competition since the 2014 World Championships.

Earlier this fall, Gold finished last of six skaters in the free skate-only Japan Open on Oct. 1, fifth at Skate America in October and eighth at Trophée de France in November.

Gold has spoken openly about trying to mentally and physically recover from last season’s world championships, where she dropped from first after the short program to finish fourth, and taking weeks off from training in the summer offseason.

Even with the rough skates, Gold still ranks fourth among U.S. women in top scores this season, behind Ashley Wagner, Mariah Bell and Mirai Nagasu.

She could struggle — to a degree — at the U.S. Championships in January and still make the three-woman world championships team. Gold has finished first or second at all four of her senior nationals appearances.